UAW chief calls Trump a “job killer” before his visit to Michigan.

The head of the largest U.S. auto union highlighted Thursday the yawning gap between former President Donald Trump’s campaign promises to protect the nation’s auto industry and the 2024 Republican candidate’s White House record — which includes hundreds of thousands of lost manufacturing jobs .

Shawn Fain, president of the United Auto Workers, argued in a campaign conference call for Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, that “there is a stark contrast between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.”

“Kamala Harris has sided with labor,” Fain said of the UAW-backed candidate. “She did it. Donald Trump serves himself. He has always served himself.”

Fain took aim at Trump’s claims that he was the best choice for U.S. autoworkers and had “always had their backs,” saying:

Check out the assembly plant in Lordstown, Ohio. [Trump] told the workers there: “Don’t sell your houses.” The plant was closed. He came to Warren, Michigan a week or two ago. Want to talk again about how much he cares about auto workers. But we had [General Motors’] The Warren powertrain plant was closed under his watch. He didn’t do anything. Trump stood there in 2016 and promised that he would not allow a single plant to close.

However, more plant closures and offshoring occurred during the Trump administration, as domestic automobile production fell from nearly 12.2 million units in 2016, the last full year of the Obama administration, to under 8.2 million units in 2020, the year last full year of Trump’s term, plummeted. according to the US Bureau of Transportation Statistics. While Covid-19 impacted production this year, fewer than 10.9 million vehicles were manufactured domestically in the year before the pandemic.

Fain, noticing this trend, called Trump the “job-killer-in-chief.”

The UAW chief also ridiculed reports that many attendees who wore “Auto Workers for Trump” T-shirts at a Republican rally in Detroit on Tuesday were not real auto workers.

“It’s pathetic. Everything he does is fraud,” Fain said of Trump.

Referring to the billionaire CEO of electric vehicle maker Tesla, Fain added that Trump “sits there and applauds Elon Musk for trying to fire striking workers, and they laugh about it.”

“And that’s why I said Donald Trump is a scab,” the union leader added, using the term for non-union workers who cross picket lines during strikes.

During last year’s UAW strike for a fair labor contract, President Joe Biden made history by becoming the first sitting U.S. president ever to join striking workers on a strike line. Four years earlier, Harris, then a U.S. senator from California running for president, walked a picket line with striking UAW workers in Reno, Nevada.

The Biden-Harris administration has often been called the most pro-worker presidency in modern history.

Fain’s comments came hours before Trump angered many Michigan residents by telling local business owners at a rally in Detroit that the whole country “will end up being like Detroit if Harris wins” – which is in the midst of an economic recovery.

Congressman Shri Thanedar (D-Mich.), who represents the city, urged Trump to “keep Detroit and our people out of his mouth.”

“Detroit is a city with a booming economy, a diverse culture and some of the best people in America,” he said, adding that the heavily Democratic city “will elect Kamala Harris.”

Michigan Democratic Party Chairwoman Lavora Barnes said Thursday: “Plain and simple, a second Donald Trump presidency would be a disaster for Michigan workers. His agenda will increase costs and destroy jobs.”

“When he was president,” she added, “Trump gave tax cuts to the rich at the expense of Michigan’s working families, weakening our economy during the pandemic and only helping the rich get richer.”